


We Were Meant To Be

by Snow



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Character of Color, Community: au_bingo, Female Character of Color, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-22
Updated: 2010-06-22
Packaged: 2017-10-10 05:50:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/96273
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snow/pseuds/Snow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jennifer Sisko didn't die at Wolf 359.</p>
            </blockquote>





	We Were Meant To Be

**Author's Note:**

> Written for AU_bingo, for the square Alternate History: Someone never died

"Jennifer!" Benjamin knelt over his wife's body. The ship was breaking apart around him, but he needed a little more time. He needed her to be alive.

"Dad." Jake still looked unharmed, as he had been when Benjamin had first run over.

"Can you walk?" Benjamin asked.

"Of course." Jake was eleven and prone to upset when it was implied that he couldn't do anything. Now, though, he just sounded like he was surprised by his own answer.

"Good." Benjamin had found a pulse and he would take the opportunity to thank whoever necessary for that later, once his family was off the ship. Jennifer was still unconscious as Benjamin picked her up and headed to the escape pods.

Most of the medical crew that could evacuate already had, so the only medical attention Jennifer could receive was what he could give. Still, a scan showed no internal bleeding and no broken bones. Benjamin promised himself that he would stop worrying as soon as Jennifer regained consciousness.

* * *

"I'm fine." Jennifer grabbed Benjamin's hand until he looked into her eyes. "I'm alive. I might not have been, but the fact is, I am."

Ben squeezed her hand. "It seems stupid to take these kinds of risks when we don't have to."

"Then resign from Starfleet." Jennifer let go of his hand so she could throw her arms up. "We'll move to New Orleans and you can help your father run his restaurant. Because that's the only way this is going to work. If you think being on a ship is that terribly dangerous, then I don't want to be waiting on some planet for news of your death."

"Okay," Ben said. "I'll request a posting on Earth. Or Mars. We can both live planetside. I don't want to lose you, Jennifer."

She thought he understood now. "I don't want to lose you either."

* * *

After Wolf 359 Ben advanced more slowly through the ranks. He was careful, cautious, and at the second anniversary of the date he suggested again that Jennifer might be happier staying in New York, where she had family.

"No," she said.

"You can write your novels just as well there."

"_Ben._ I married you, though maybe you don't remember that. I don't want to stay somewhere you're not. So I could die if you take a posting that's elsewhere. I could die here too. We're none of us invincible, not even you. I don't want Jake growing up without a father, and maybe you don't want him growing up without a mother but trust me, if I have any say in it, _that's not going to happen_."

"What if it's Jake that dies?" Ben asked.

"Snap out of it, Ben," Jennifer said. "Yes, life is dangerous. And I understand that we both lost friends at Wolf 359. But you need to stop living there. It's time to move on. So tell me why we're having this conversation again."

"There's talk about what's going to happen when the Cardassians withdraw from Bajor."

"If they offer you a position near Bajor, I want you to take it."

"I don't know," Benjamin said. "It could be-"

"It could be wonderful. You could help them. Understand, I am not afraid of the future. You never used to be."

"I'm not the writer. I'm not the one with the gift for words. I don't know how to tell you how scared I was that I had lost you."

"You can be scared," Jennifer said. "For an instant, or for longer. But not for a lifetime. Besides, if the Cardassians withdraw, Bajor will be relatively low risk. I never wanted to spend my whole life in the same solar system, Ben. And when I married you, I think you promised adventure."

"We'll talk about it if I'm approached." Jennifer sensed that was as good as she was going to get right now.

* * *

"They want me to be on the station around Bajor."

"Are you going to take it?" Jennifer asked.

"Yes," Ben said. "I think I will. Unless you don't want me to?"

Jennifer gave that exactly as much serious thought as it deserved, and laughed. "Jake," she called out, "We're going to Bajor."

* * *

Jennifer, with her years of experience writing novels, couldn't think of any better descriptor for the station they entered now than a mess.

"I'm told the Cardassians decided to have some fun the day they left," Miles O'Brien, the station's Chief of Operations told Ben. "Four Bajorans were killed trying to protect their shops."

Jennifer sighed. At least this time the death and destruction seemed to be a beginning, and there was still so much opportunity to build here.

"Why hasn't anyone cleaned this up?" Ben asked.

As O'Brien went into an explanation, Jennifer took Jake aside. "You okay?" she asked, amending a "kiddo," just because she knew it would annoy him. Her son was fourteen now. He'd moved on from Wolf 359 almost immediately after it happened. She'd moved on a couple of months later. And Ben was moving on now.

**Author's Note:**

> I welcome and appreciate all kinds of comments, though I would (obviously) prefer if any criticism was constructive. :)


End file.
